Space jam: The different approaches the billionaires are taking in commercial space flight

7/20/21 8:00PM

Space jam

‍By now you've probably seen that billionaires have been strapping themselves to giant rockets and sending themselves into space. Whether that's a good / fair / efficient / ethical use of their vast resources is certainly a debate worth having but — leaving that issue to one side — it's interesting to note just how different Bezos' and Branson's actual approach to getting to space is.

The Amazon founder's approach is probably a little more what you would expect of a short trip to space. Bezos jumped in a small capsule with 3 others, including the very cool 82-year-old Wally Funk, and blasted to space to more than 350,000ft above sea level in about 4 minutes. From there the passenger capsule detached itself from the rocket booster, and gently parachuted down to earth with the entire thrill ride over in about 10 minutes.

The Virgin Galactic approach was arguably a little more interesting. A "relatively" normal looking plane took off and gently climbed to around 50,000ft over the course of about 45 minutes, carrying a separate spaceship with it. That spaceship was then detached and its rocket fired, allowing it to climb to an apogee (peak altitude) of around 282,700ft. The spaceship then descended more slowly than the Blue Origin capsule, eventually landing like a conventional plane after about an hour of total flight time.

‍Tickets to space

‍On top of the ego boost and media coverage, both men are hoping to make a buck from their successful space flights. Bezos has announced that orders to fly to space were already nearing $100m while Virgin Galactic is hoping to start providing commercial space flights to paying customers in 2022.

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JetBlue is raising its bag fees as fuel costs squeeze airlines

JetBlue will reportedly hike its bag fees, as the cost of jet fuel continues to climb amid the war in Iran. It’s the latest example of carriers finding ways to push rising costs onto travelers.

Last week, United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby said that if fuel prices remain elevated, fares would need to rise another 20% for his airline to break even this year.

As CNBC reported, when one airline raises fees, others tend to follow.

Earlier this month, JetBlue hiked its first-quarter outlook for operating revenue per seat mile to between 5% and 7%, saying that strong Q1 demand helped “partially offset additional expenses realized from operational disruptions and rising fuel costs.” Now, the carrier appears to be making moves to further boost revenue to offset those costs.

Earlier on Monday, JetBlue rival Alaska Air lowered its Q1 profit forecast. The refining margins for the carrier’s cheapest fuel option — sourced from Singapore and representing about 20% of Alaska’s overall supply — have spiked 400% since February.

JetBlue did not immediately respond to a request for comment.